Ebenezer Howard is remembered for his Garden City vision and his pioneering role in town planning. Arguably, though, the part of his legacy we feel most strongly today is a question he asked: who benefits when a place becomes valuable? In 1903, First Garden City Ltd bought farmland in north Hertfordshire at agricultural prices. Homes, factories, shops and streets followed, people moved in and made it a community, and the land became far more valuable. In most towns, that rise in value goes to whoever happens to own the land. Howard wanted the value created by the community to go back to the community, and holding the estate as a whole was how First Garden City Ltd made that possible. We now call this Land Value Capture, and 125 years on it is still the driving force behind Letchworth’s success.
The Garden City turns 125 in 2028. The Heritage Foundation’s five-year plan, Strategy 2028, sets out how we are continuing to evolve the Land Value Capture principle working up to that anniversary and beyond. Whilst the principle of Value Capture has been consistent throughout our history, the realities of being reliant on property market income from an ageing estate is much more volatile and challenging. Our first strategic aim is to improve our financial resilience through active asset management and development. Everything else in the strategy depends on it, from looking after the town’s heritage and green spaces to our investment in tackling poverty. All of this is paid for by income from the estate.
Letchworth Garden City Heritage Foundation is a community benefit society with charitable status, and the largest commercial landlord in Letchworth. Income from our investment properties pays for our charitable work, which has a substantial impact on the Garden City and its residents. All of it is reinvested in Letchworth.
The model works as a cycle. Income from the estate pays for its upkeep and for investment in the community. That is often referred to as place stewardship – a term which again Howard pioneered. A well-kept town is somewhere people want to live and run a business, and that keeps up the value of the estate and the income it brings in.
In 2025, for every £1 we received from our investments:
was spent managing and maintaining the estate
was spent on community investment and capital expenditure
Most of that money goes back into the estate itself. Many of our buildings are more than a century old, and the cost of keeping them safe, lettable and energy efficient keeps rising.
The community share is spread widely. In 2025 we gave £582,000 in grants to 23 organisations, including Citizens Advice North Herts and Letchworth Foodbank, which help the residents who need support most. The estate also includes an estimated 59,000 trees and the Greenway, and Land Value Capture pays for those too.
Land Value Capture will also fund the new Letchworth Garden City Community Trust. Going forward the Trust will take over the Foundation’s support for learning, culture, community, wellbeing and making Letchworth a great place to grow up, leaving the Heritage Foundation to concentrate on the estate and the built environment including the town’s very special built heritage.
Being both a charity and the town’s largest commercial landlord takes some balancing. The Foundation’s purpose is to fulfil our charitable objectives. To do that we have a fiduciary duty to get the best commercial value from our investment properties as that means we can deliver the greatest community investment. That means protecting the financial health of the property portfolio while keeping a mix of tenants that works for the people who use the town.
Strategy 2028 sets targets for this. We aim to cut vacant property across the estate to 6.5% and bad debts to 1.7%, and to make the whole portfolio compliant with energy performance (EPC) standards. We are making significant progress towards them, and the latest figures are in our Annual Report.
Case study: a new future for the Ernest Gardiner Treatment Centre
We have recently completed a new 15-year lease at the Ernest Gardiner Treatment Centre with Acorn Early Years Foundation.
Acorn Early Years Foundation is a registered charity and not-for-profit social enterprise. It has more than 35 years’ experience in early years education and childcare, and runs nurseries, forest schools and out-of-school provision, with a focus on improving outcomes for children and families.
As part of the lease, Acorn will carry out a substantial fit-out and investment programme to create a high-quality facility, which shows it intends to stay for the long term.
The letting gives the Heritage Foundation a long-term income and reduces the amount of empty property we hold, which counts towards our Strategy 2028 target. It also brings early years services to local families, in line with our charitable objectives and our aim of making Letchworth a great place to grow up. It is a good example of Land Value Capture working as intended
As a landlord, we must ensure tenants keep to the terms of their leases and pay rent due, for the sake of the town as a whole. Occasionally this means ending a lease. Because it happens so rarely, these cases tend to attract attention, and some people feel that ending a tenancy goes against the ethos of being a landlord with charitable purposes.
Ending a lease is always a last resort, and we only do it after far more consultation with the tenant than a commercial landlord would usually offer. We know that cases such these can cause strong feelings. We would ask people to see them in context. Our job is to manage the estate fairly and consistently for everyone who lives and works in Letchworth.
We take the same long view when we sell property. The Heritage Foundation looks after the town for now, and part of that job is to leave a Letchworth fit for future pioneers, whether they are its future stewards or its future residents.
As part of Strategy 2028 we are also asking how our endowment is made up. Most of it is property we own within Letchworth Garden City. That is part of the town’s history, but it is also a risk. Our income depends on the local property market, and when demand changes, locally or nationally, much of the estate is affected at the same time. Online shopping and home working are two recent examples that have triggered a fall in demand for commercial property that we are responding to. Spreading the endowment more widely reduces that risk.
As part of our Strategic Aim 1, we are diversifying our investments by selling selected properties, mainly those with the lowest returns, and reinvesting around three-quarters of the proceeds into ethical listed investments that generate a future income for the Foundation to spend in the town. This rebalances the portfolio and spreads our risk over a wider range of assets. It also produces income for more charitable work.
The rest of the sale proceeds are spent investing in the buildings we keep. Some properties now need major repairs or substantial work to meet energy efficiency standards, and paying for that from rental income alone would mean cutting what we spend on the community. Sometimes a building would cost more to bring up to standard than it will ever earn, and selling it is the best way to look after the rest of the estate.
We never sell a building to raise quick funds. Every disposal is planned as part of our long-term strategy, and where land is sold for development, Garden City principles guide how it is done.
Selling a property does mean giving up any future rise in that building’s value. However, the value the community has built up over more than a century goes back into the endowment, where it is spread more safely and can earn more for the town. The principles that Howard set out are still being followed when a building changes hands.
We know these decisions can be emotive in a town like Letchworth. The sale of Plinston Hall, a building many people care about, divided opinion. Ultimately, the sale will attract new business to the town and is an important step in making the endowed estate more financially resilient. For us to continue stewarding the estate and generating the future financial resilience of the town, there will be more disposals in the coming months and years.
Just as the story of Letchworth Garden City is circular, so is the ownership of its buildings. We have built and developed properties across the town, and over time some will pass to new owners, who will develop them in turn and build their own trust with the community. The income they release is reinvested in the town’s future, and the cycle that Howard set in motion in 1903 begins again on a stronger foundation.